Brothers and Brain Tumors
by PandasWearGlasses
Summary: Sawada Tsunayoshi has spent a life time withering away in the shadows. Without friends or a loving family, he's lived life waiting for death. Now though, with death a very real possibility and a brand new bubbling desire to live, courtesy to his maybe-best-friend-maybe-boyfriend, he makes one last grab at life. He'll need help from his estranged brother though.


Giotto groaned himself into consciousness. He hurt. Every part of him hurt. His stomach, his limbs, his throat… most importantly his head. It was as if someone had set off a ravaging stick of dynamite in his head, scrambling his brains until they were less recognizable than his Physics teacher after she went through a 400 pound weight loss. Not to mention he could have sworn there was a woodpecker incessantly ramming his beak on the inside of his skull.

_Knock Knock Knock. _

_Knock Knock Knock. _

He groggily pulled a pillow over his head in an effort to muffle the irksome noise.

"OI! Giotto, answer the damn door!

_Oh…. _That made a lot more sense, but it was even more irksome. I mean, seriously? Now he was expected to stand up and walk all the way across the loft to the door, just to speak to someone who he really didn't want to see right now. True, he didn't _really_ know who it was; but whoever was idiotic and bothersome enough to knock on his door when he had such a monumental hangover was clearly not someone he wanted to talk to. He walked past the impromptu living room, kicking G (the one who'd alerted him to the door) off from his make-do bed: the coffee table.

He was pretty sure Asari was already gone, always one to rise early. That man had an unnatural ability to completely avoid hangovers, no matter what he had to drink the previous night… and that guy drank some _crazy _shit. As a matter of fact, Giotto was unable to recall ever actually seeing Asari drunk period. He paused on his journey to the door to contemplate that thought. Well… there was that one time that… no, Asari had shown them all his new sword move, something he would _not _have been able to do if he had been drunk.

He was reminded of his current mission when a fresh trio of knocks resounded from the door. He shrugged his thoughts off. Of course he couldn't remember seeing Asari drunk. He could barely remember his own name right now. He continued on his journey to the door, overstepping the unconscious body that belonged to Lampo. When he finally made it to the entrance he spent at least 3 minutes fumbling with the locks. Why did he have so damn many? Who really needed four locks _and _a deadbolt? He'd forgotten which ones opened to the left and which ones to the right so he must have tried at least twenty combinations before he got it right, with some repeats of course (Cut him some slack though, he _was _hung over).

"What!?" He snapped irritably when he finally got the door open. He'd been expecting one of last night's party goers who had forgotten something vital like a phone or a purse or… uh… some underwear. Instead he found a tiny quivering… _kid… _looking as though he'd just been slapped at instead of snapped at. _Oooh, _he thought stupidly, _that rhymes. _

"S-s-sorry to bother you," the kid stammered. He was speaking so softly Giotto had to strain his ears to make out what he was saying.

"Then don't bother me." Giotto told him, already moving to close the door.

"W-wait!" The boy lunged, grabbing hold of the edge of the door frantically.

"What!?" The blond found himself repeating a second time. "If you've got something to say then spit it out. If not then leave."

"C-can I talk to you?"

"You're talking to me. If you don't say something substantial within the next three seconds you will no longer be talking to me." The college student craned his neck as if he were looking at something in the apartment and began counting down. "3…2…"

"That's! I meant if I could talk to you inside." The kid said, gesturing towards the door.

Giotto considered this for a moment before deciding against it. After all, his apartment looked like crap inside because of the stupid party that he now _greatly _regretted having. "Nah. Now if you don't mind I'm going back to bed."

"_Please." _The brown haired boy looked at him with the most pleading puppy dog eyes he'd ever seen. And… all coherent thought left his mind. He knew he'd wanted to say no, but DAMN those eyes were big… and watery… and cute… and crap.

"Yeah. Whatever. Fine I guess. You're going to sit on the sofa and not touch anything and I swear if I find anything missing later I won't hesitate to call the cops on you… What was your name again?" Never mind the fact that if anything was missing it was probably from the party last night but whatever, not like there was a crime against scaring the crap out of little kids that were bothersome-ly persistent and unfairly adorable.

He led the kid inside, muttering "Watch your step" as he leaped over Lampo's body once again.

"Hiiee-" the kid let out a rather un-masculine squeak before muffling it with his hand. So the kid not only looked like a girl, he acted like one too.

"Tsuna," the boy said suddenly, apparently recalling Giotto's earlier question. Then he slapped his hand over his mouth again, realizing that he'd wanted to introduce himself by his full name, and hopefully make the upcoming awkward conversation flow easier.

Giotto merely quirked an eyebrow at the boy before walking into the kitchen to fix himself some greasy food and a nice hot coffee. Decaf, of course, because everyone knew caffeine never helped a hangover. He heard another unmanly squeak followed by a loud crash and groans in more than one voice. Hehe. The kid probably tripped over G and fell onto the coffee table. He glanced over his shoulder and confirmed his suspicion.

"S-s-s-s-" The poor kid seemed too horrified to be able to form even a sentence.

"Spit it out!" G growled vehemently.

"Sorry! I'm so sorry! I didn't mean to- I mean, it was an accident. I'll pay to get it f-fixed if you want-"

"On second thought, shut up," the tattooed man cut the poor teen's frantic apologies off.

"S-"the brunet made to apologize for apologizing too much but silenced himself in light of his new order.

Giotto chuckled conspicuously from his viewing point in the kitchen. "I see you two've met."

"Unfortunately," muttered G, causing the brunette to flush a bright red. "Who is he anyway?" He asked, making no attempt at discretion as he jerked his head towards the boy in question.

"No clue," Giotto replied cheerily, in a much better mood now that he'd consumed a portion of the deliciously fattening breakfast he'd prepared. "Says he wants to talk to me though, something important or somethin' or other."

"You sure 'bout that? He didn't just knock on the wrong door or something?" Tsuna paled as he suddenly realized that was a _very _real possibility. He wouldn't put it past himself to get the address wrong.

"W-w-wait. You _are _Sawada Ieyasu right?"the brunet questioned pleadingly. _Please let it be him, please let it be him._ He'd squeezed his eyes shut in anticipation of hearing a resounding 'No', so he missed the look of pure astonishment the two men gave him.

"The name's Giotto Vongola," the blond corrected, his demeanor suddenly hardening. Tsuna's heart sank hearing those words. So he really _had _screwed everything up and gotten the wrong apartment. He should have known… I mean, there was no way his brother could live in such a nice apartment as this, especially fresh out of college… if he'd even _gone _to college. For all he knew his brother could be a high school dropout and live on the streets….

"I see…" Tsuna muttered, unable to hide his misery at the piece of news. He stood to leave. "Sorry to bother you.

Giotto, however, could not resist elaborating when he saw the shadows overtaking the boy's features. "But… I did use to call myself Sawada Ieyasu a while back." It was amazing how that one sentence so visibly changed the kid's whole demeanor. It was almost like re-inflating an old balloon. He immediately straightened out from his slouch and a look of pure relief washed over his face.

"I see," he said again, more eagerly. "So Giotto would be your surname?"

"No, it's Italian. Look at it like you look at English."

Tsuna stared blankly at him before abashedly muttering, "I failed English." _Surprise Surprise, _Giotto caught himself thinking.

He limited, however, his derision to a mere eye roll before deciding to spell it out for the boy so they could finally move on. "Giotto would be my given name, and Vongola would be my family name."

'Oh' Tsuna mouthed, embarrassed at not having been able to figure that out.

"Now, if we could forget about that for a moment. Tsuna, where did you hear that name? I've put in quite a bit of effort to make sure that didn't get out, but then you waltz in here and shout it around like its nothing."Tsuna's face regained its pink tint.

"Sorry… That's actually... kind of what I wanted to talk to you about" Sort of, not really. "Umm… Giotto-san you may not-"

"Wait wait wait, who said you could call me by my first name? We've never met before, so what makes you think you can call me so familiarly?" Truth be told he didn't really care, but messing with this kid was proving to be kind of fun. He was starting to see how he might make a game out of seeing how dark he could get the kid to blush.

"B-b-but you called me Tsuna!" the brunet tried to defend himself.

Giotto rolled his eyes and pointed out the obvious, "That was the only name you gave me. I didn't really have a choice, now did I?" Oooh… that was _quite _an interesting shade.

"Well, th-that's also what I wanted to talk to you about."

"So let me get this straight," G finally interrupted. "You wanted to talk to him about your _names!?" _Awww… Giotto thought childishly, G got him to blush even darker than he had!

"No!" The boy exploded in embarrassment, reminding Giotto of fireworks. "Giotto-san you may not remember but I know you! I mean… you know _me! _So I guess… we know each other? Arghh," the brunet pulled at his hair in frustration at his incoherency. Suddenly he shouted a statement he apparently thought would make everything clear, but at first thought was seemingly random. "My name is Sawada Tsunayoshi!"

Giotto, who'd opened his mouth to tease the kid, left his jaw hanging so wide Tsuna probably could have stuffed both his hands in there if he wanted to. G quirked an eyebrow and smiled crookedly.

"Well this is certainly the most interesting 'Day After' we've ever had. I think it tops the time you lost your cell phone in that one chick's hair. Do you have any more of that coffee?"

* * *

Right, so, I wrote this a hella long time ago, and I sort of doubt that it'll be continued, but I do have a lot of ideas for this.

The problem is, Reborn isn't really my fandom anymore, and hasn't been for more than a year, so if I _did _want to continue this, I would have to rummage in my memories for all the character details. It's all very unlikely.

Either way, tell me what you think. I LOVE constructive criticism :] Don't love two word reviews or begging for updates though... :/


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